Quote 1
"In the end," said Mustapha Mond, "the Controllers realized that force was no good. The slower but infinitely surer methods of ectogenesis, neo-Pavlovian conditioning and hypnopædia…" (3.184)
Rock smashes scissors, scissors cut paper, paper covers rock, and science beats force. The question is, is there a difference between control by "force" and control by "science?" Can "science" be seen as just another—if more sophisticated—form of violence?
Quote 2
"That's because we don't allow them to be like that. We preserve them from diseases. We keep their internal secretions artificially balanced at a youthful equilibrium. We don't permit their magnesium-calcium ratio to fall below what it was at thirty. We give them transfusion of young blood. We keep their metabolism permanently stimulated. So, of course, they don't look like that. Partly," he added, "because most of them die long before they reach this old creature's age. Youth almost unimpaired till sixty, and then, crack! the end." (7.22)
In eliminating the aging process, science has destroyed a very basic element of the human experience. Mustapha comments that old age is dangerous for the community—not because of physical frailty, but because of mental prowess. Sadly, Lenina is too caught up in the former to acknowledge the latter during her visit to Malpais.
Quote 3
It's the same with agriculture. We could synthesize every morsel of food, if we wanted to. But we don't. We prefer to keep a third of the population on the land. For their own sakes – because it takes longer to get food out of the land than out of a factory. Besides, we have our stability to think of. We don't want to change. Every change is a menace to stability. That's another reason why we're so chary of applying new inventions. Every discovery in pure science is potentially subversive; even science must sometimes be treated as a possible enemy. Yes, even science."
[…]
"Yes," Mustapha Mond was saying, "that's another item in the cost of stability. It isn't only art that's incompatible with happiness; it's also science. Science is dangerous; we have to keep it most carefully chained and muzzled." (16.51-3)
The World Controllers clearly recognize the threats to their power and to their ability to control. But to "muzzle" science would seem an impossible task. Or not… what does Brave New World argue? Can science be contained?